A blog on politics and education, supporting socialist ideals and equality of opportunity. Against obscene wealth and inequality.

Sunday, 12 July 2015

Osborne has done Labour a favour

Of course, as Chris Leslie said in the Commons, this
week`s budget was "entirely concerned with chasing headlines" to support the
chancellor`s personal ambitions (Morning Star,10/07/15). In fact, Osborne
has done the Labour party a massive favour. Although he was attempting to finish
off what the election result had started by stealing ideas from Labour`s
manifesto, Osborne may well have seriously miscalculated; he has illustrated
beyond doubt that Labour should never try to out-Tory the Tories on business, as
his proposal to have corporation tax levels 22% points lower than those in the
US has shown. His attempts to woo the "working people of Britain" are already
being revealed by the Institute of Fiscal Studies to be misleading and little
more than electoral posturing. Resolution Foundation`s revelation that, with
cuts to tax credits, the real living wage needs to be above £11 an hour, and
higher, when inflation is taken into consideration, by 2020, needs to be shouted
by Labour from the rooftops. Failing to attack Tory mythology led to the last
election defeat, so all four leadership candidates should know exactly what is
immediately needed.

Labour should also be clearer, now, about
where to target their policies; research showing women being hit more than twice
as hard as men by the budget makes the female vote an obvious target, as long as
no idiotic pink buses are involved, while the removal of the maintenance grant,
withdrawal of housing benefit from 18 to 21 year olds, and exemption from the
so-called "new living wage" for under 25s should alert Labour to the electoral
potential thereby provided, especially when private landlords inevitably
retaliate to Osborne`s changes with rent increases. With public sector workers
facing more job cuts and decreasing real wages, and the government`s attack on
six million trade unionists yet to start, Corbyn should not be the only
leadership contender supporting forthcoming industrial action!

The Tories` timing of this "emergency
budget", so-called presumably to ensure floating voters have time to forget
about the cuts in time for the 2020 election, was also intended to use the
forthcoming summer recess to their advantage, but Labour must not allow the
details of this duplicitous budget to be forgotten, and continue the offensive
against it until long after the next leader is chosen.

Labour will never be sufficiently
pro-business to win over most wavering Tories, but the race to win the "fairness
vote" is theirs for the taking!